


see the future in spite of the past

by somehowunbroken



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Future Fic, Getting Back Together, M/M, Olympics, Slow Burn, Talking Like Adults
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-07
Updated: 2019-03-07
Packaged: 2019-11-06 22:41:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17948513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somehowunbroken/pseuds/somehowunbroken
Summary: Making the Olympic team is a dream come true, and Mitch is looking forward to playing in the games with the most stacked team he can remember Canada ever sending.And then he gets there and finds out who his roommate is.





	see the future in spite of the past

**Author's Note:**

  * For [taxingme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/taxingme/gifts).



> hi taxingme! i saw your olmypics prompt and immediately knew what i had to do. it's not exactly what you asked for, but i hope you enjoy it anyway. happy dylan's birthday <3
> 
> my eternal thanks to M, A, and A, who alpha read this as i was writing it and encouraged me to continue, and to my significant otter for a wonderful beta job.
> 
> title is from vienna teng's "[go on, make promises](https://youtu.be/PtmJ4LRSgaw?t=54)" which doesn't fit overall, but that line was applicable here.

"Oh, you have got to be fucking kidding me," Mitch hears, and he knows before turning around exactly who his roommate is.

He doesn't let his shoulders tighten, because that would be losing, and apparently part of him will always return to being sixteen and too pissed off to function when he hears that tone of voice. "Hey, Stromer," he says without pulling his hands out of his suitcase. He definitely doesn't remember what he was in there looking for in the first place, but it gives him something to do. "Welcome to Stockholm."

"Fuck," Dylan says, and Mitch knows, he _knows_ that he shouldn't, that he should take a second and get a grip on himself before he moves, but he ignores the part of his brain that's yelling about danger and turns towards the door.

Dylan looks exhausted, but that's been true since before Mitch met him, and age hasn't lessened it any. The transcontinental flight probably didn't help anything, either, but he looks… good, Mitch decides. Well, shit.

"Hi," Mitch manages. "For the record, I had nothing to do with this."

"I didn't figure," Dylan says. There's no animosity in his voice, but Mitch would probably rather have Dylan be pissed off than this weird blank version of himself. Maybe this is just who he is now, Mitch thinks. God knows they haven't actually had anything resembling a conversation since—

Well. It's been a while.

"I'm sure we can get them to switch something around," Mitch says, shrugging. "Patty Marleau is with the coaching staff. He'd be fine with—"

"I can be cool with it if you can," Dylan interrupts, tossing his bag on the bed. "I mean, we're probably going to end up on a line together at some point. If we can't even room together, we're definitely not winning Olympic gold."

"Fuck that," Mitch says instantly.

Dylan gives him a crooked smile. "I mean, yeah. I promise not to get in your way, you promise not to get in mine, and we act like we're actually almost thirty instead of still in juniors. Deal?"

"Deal," Mitch says, smiling back. It feels tentative on his face, like he's not sure what's too much smile or what might not be enough, but Dylan just nods before turning back to his bed and starting to unpack.

Well, Mitch thinks as he stares at Dylan's back. He hadn't known what to expect from his first Olympics, but he sure as hell knows he wasn't expecting _this_.

The simple explanation is this: they weren't friends, and then they were, and then they weren't again.

The longer, much more complicated explanation starts when they were kids together, annoying the shit out of one another on various mites and bantam teams across the GTA. Mitch vividly remembers seeing how red Dylan's face was getting and making the conscious decision to keep pushing, and he remembers how much _fun_ it was to get under Dylan's skin. It kept escalating and escalating, through being kids and into being teenagers who should know better but pretended they didn't, and it kept going and going until it snapped.

Luckily, it snapped in the good way, and they were friends. Good friends, too, the kind who would call each other just to hang out while they did homework, or Skype-watch movies at the same time, or talk quietly about the nerves that wouldn't go away during their draft year. Whatever else Mitch has to say about his relationship with Dylan, he'll never deny that they were incredibly close. He remembers thinking they were heading somewhere neither of them was quite sure about, going too fast towards an uncertain destination, like they were holding hands on a rollercoaster in the dark, clutching each other tighter and tighter.

And then, well. The rollercoaster came to a stop; it always comes to a stop at the end, and the lights come back on, and they found themselves untangling their hands and leaping away from each other.

It's possible, Mitch thinks a little wryly, that he's had too long to craft his metaphors. They don't make any fucking sense anymore.

The less poetic explanation is that they both got drafted, and then they both got sent back down, and then Mitch got called up and Dylan got fucked over and fucked over and fucked over. Conversations got shorter, further apart, and Mitch isn't sure if he stopped reaching out or if Dylan stopped answering. The specifics probably don't matter anymore, because the truth is probably that they both fucked it up, and when Mitch tried to reach out, tentative and unsure after the trade rumours started while Dylan was still in Arizona, Dylan had blown up. Mitch has never once in his life had an ounce of chill, and they'd fought kind of viciously, and now it's eight goddamn years later and here they are, Mitch watching Dylan silently unpack his suitcase two days before they're supposed to start their pre-tournament practices for the Olympics.

"How's, uh," Mitch asks, swallowing past the weird clicking in his throat. "How's Calgary?"

Dylan snorts. "Cold," he says. "I miss Tampa."

"It's colder in Toronto on average than it is in Calgary," Mitch says, rolling his eyes. "Also, I hate to break it to you, but you play hockey for a living. If you're not used to the cold by now, I don't know what to tell you."

"Calgary likes to spit winter in your face," Dylan says, shrugging as he pulls out a stack of shirts, frowns at them, and dumps them into a drawer. "Toronto gets snow. Calgary gets _evil_ snow."

"Evil snow," Mitch echoes. "That's, uh. What makes snow evil?"

"Calgary," Dylan says, shooting him a grin. "I don't know, man. Calgary's a city. They like me enough for now, and that means I like it enough for now."

There's something itching to climb its way out of Mitch's mouth, but he bites down hard on all his thoughts about Dylan's abilities, Dylan's incredibly creative playmaking, his skills and his drive and his work ethic. He's sure they're no less true about the Dylan in front of him now, twenty-eight and tired of hearing about it, than they were about the kid he knew forever ago, but he doesn't have the right to say any of it anymore. He shrugs instead, smiling back. "Well, let's make Stockholm like you for now," he says, and it makes Dylan laugh, short and surprised.

It shouldn't feel like a victory. It does anyway.

-0-

"You're a meddler," Mitch announces as he pushes into Connor's hotel room. "I don't appreciate it, buddy."

"Deal with it," Connor replies, which is pretty much what Mitch was expecting, honestly. Connor is sitting on his bed with an iPad propped up in his lap, and he doesn't look away from it when Mitch plops down on the bed beside him.

"Davo," Mitch says, and maybe there's a little bit of a whine in his voice, but he's not going to back down on this one. "Seriously?"

"Seriously," Connor replies, finally looking up from his iPad. Even odds on whether it's baby photos or lineup ideas, Mitch decides. "You guys need to work it out, or we're never going to get this team off the ground."

"We can still play together even if we're not best friends," Mitch says. "We're not kids anymore."

"That's kind of my point, Marns," Connor says, not backing down at all. "You're _not_ kids. I know you had a bad breakup, but—"

"Wait, whoa, what," Mitch cuts in, holding a hand up for emphasis. "We had a _what_ now?"

Connor blinks at him. "You guys broke up when Dylan went to Tucson," he says, tone cautious for the first time. "Which, like, I'm sure you had your reasons, but it's been almost a decade."

"Is that what he told you?" Mitch asks. He's got that crazy rollercoaster feeling again, hitting a turn he didn't see coming, spiralling down with his heart in his throat.

"No," Connor says, and some of the tension drops out of Mitch's shoulders. "I just… that's what it looked like from the outside, and he never wanted to talk about it, so I figured I was right. He's always sucked at heartbreak."

Mitch snorts. "That's not what happened."

"I'm getting that, yeah," Connor says. "You want to talk about it?"

"No," Mitch says shortly.

Connor sighs. "I don't know how to help you guys if you don't tell me what's going on."

It's a moment before Mitch can respond. "Just throwing it out there, but maybe don't meddle, what the fuck," he says, trying not to let how pissed he is bleed into his voice. "We're not your teammates, and you're not our coach. Maybe just let us be who we already are, huh?"

"You're my friends," Connor says, hunching his shoulders like he does when he's feeling defensive. "I just wanted to—"

"Don't," Mitch says, standing up and heading for the door. " _Don't_. Stay out of it, Connor."

"Mitch," Connor says, but Mitch needs to—not, he thinks as he pushes out of the room. He needs to cool down, chill for a little while before he has to interact with people again. He grabs his phone from his pocket and really only hesitates for a few seconds before opening up his texts.

_dude help_

The reply is almost instantaneous. _bro no can do we're enemies 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸_

 _nuclear option,_ Mitch texts back.

His phone rings. "Where are you, what's wrong," Auston says, and for all that he was teasing Mitch ten seconds ago, he sounds concerned now. "Are you okay?"

"I'm not in danger," Mitch says quickly. He closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose. "I'm—I need out of this house. I need to clear my head. I know you have, like, Team USA shit, but something kind of went down and—"

"You said nuclear option, I'm on my way," Auston replies, and it's not like Mitch was expecting anything different, but it still makes him calm a little. "This is literally the second time in a decade you've used it. Why would we even have a code word if we weren't gonna stick to the rules?"

Mitch smiles without opening his eyes. "You're a good dude. Ignore what Lilypad says about you."

"Don't worry, I do," Auston replies. "Dining hall?"

"Dining hall," Mitch confirms, finally opening his eyes back up. "I'll be there in five."

"Okay, cool," Auston says, hanging up.

It had seemed silly at the time, and it's not like it's gotten less silly to have a code word since they were rookies together, but it's always been a source of comfort for Mitch to know that there's someone in the world who will drop anything for him if he needs it. It goes both ways, for sure, and Mitch is really glad that it apparently transcends the temporary lines drawn in the sand by international tournaments.

It doesn't take him long to find Auston in the dining hall; he's pretty easy to find, given that he's the only refrigerator-sized human in the appalling Team USA gear currently in there. Mitch beelines for him and doesn't even rag him about the spangly flag monstrosity, which probably only makes Auston more concerned, but Mitch has other shit on his mind.

"Got you cocoa," Auston says, nudging the mug in front of him towards Mitch. "Do you need a hug or a person to listen?"

"The second for now, but maybe the first later," Mitch says, curling his fingers around the mug. "So my roommate is Dylan Strome."

"Uh," Auston says. His eyes actually widen a fraction, which is a true sign of shock from Auston. "I figured they'd know better."

"Connor's idea," Mitch says, looking down at his cocoa. "Connor's really, really condescending idea."

"That explains it," Auston says, and Mitch can almost hear him rolling his eyes. "Fucking busybody."

"He thinks Stromer and I broke up, and that we just need to, I don't know, roommate bond and we'll get over it," Mitch says, quieter now.

"He needs to mind his own business, wow," Auston says, clearly unimpressed. "Also, as if forcing you to spend time with your ex is a productive way to build team chemistry."

Mitch makes a face. "Stromer's not—"

"—your ex, I know," Auston says. "But it would still be shitty even if he was."

"Point," Mitch concedes. He takes a long sip of his cocoa. "I don't want to fight with anyone, but rooming with him is going to be stressful, and knowing that Captain Connor is behind the whole thing makes it worse."

Auston doesn't say anything for a moment, and then he sighs. "Do you think it was Stromer's—"

"No," Mitch cuts in. "He didn't sound any happier about it than I was, honestly."

"At least you've got that, I guess," Auston says after a moment. He shifts, and Mitch looks up to see him grinning and holding out a fun-sized bag of Skittles. "Have some emergency candy. You'll manage."

Mitch laughs and takes it. "You brought me emergency candy?"

"To make you feel better after we kick your ass," Auston says solemnly, but he's still smiling.

"Asshole," Mitch says, but he's still glad that he's got his best friend here, even if they have to be enemies for a few weeks.

-0-

"So, hey," Dylan says, skating up next to Mitch. He doesn't bump their hips together like he would've a lifetime ago; he's not even close enough to touch, not really. Mitch appreciates it and hates it all at the same time.

"Hey," Mitch says, because it feels like Dylan is waiting for some kind of response.

"This is awkward as fuck," Dylan says, and at least it's nice to know that his bluntness hasn't changed. "You're feeling it too, right?"

The confidence is new, Mitch notes. "It is, " he acknowledges.

"I'm not saying we, like, forgive and forget or whatever," Dylan says. "I'm not saying we should start over. I think we're both old enough to know that's bullshit, and anyway, I know I'd need more than the next few weeks to deal with… everything." He shrugs. "But what would you say to a truce? Not forgetting, but maybe just ignoring shit until we're back on home turf."

Mitch laughs, a little incredulous. "Just ignore it. Just like that."

Dylan opens his mouth, closes it again, and glances around. "I've learned how to," he says, voice quieter. "It's hard to unpack and process shit when you're getting kicked from team to team, so I'm pretty good at the whole 'fake it 'til you make it' thing by now."

Now it's Mitch's turn to be momentarily speechless. "I mean, when you put it that way," he says weakly.

"We don't have to do anything other than what we've been doing," Dylan says, shrugging and leaning on his stick. "But I'm pretty sure I remember hockey being a hell of a lot of fun the last time we got over our issues while we were playing together."

"You're not wrong," Mitch says, smiling briefly. "I'll try, okay? I can try."

"I'll try, too," Dylan says, straightening back up as Coach blows his whistle. "I'm in the mood to win something. Think we can manage it this time?"

"Not if you jinx us, what the fuck," Mitch says, whacking lightly at Dylan's calves.

Dylan laughs and skates backwards a few feet. "I wasn't specific!"

"I'll kick your ass," Mitch threatens, and there's a moment where all he has is the warmth in his chest from Dylan laughing, the way he can feel his mouth stretching wide with a grin, and it's light and easy. It lasts until Dylan turns and skates back to the other side of the ice, strides smoother than either of them could have dreamed when they were nineteen, and the past comes bubbling back up.

Mitch takes a deep breath, then another. Ignore it, he reminds himself. Pretend. All of the old feelings, all the tired conversations he'd had with Dylan in the privacy of his own head, all of the times he hadn't been able to talk himself into being the one to reach out to try and mend everything—put it all in a jar, screw the lid on tight, and write "do not open until after the Olympics" on the side. He can manage that for sure.

Nolan skates up beside him while Mitch is trying to re-figure out how breathing works. "Okay there, bud?" he asks, watching where Dylan is jostling with TK. "I know you guys aren't... close."

It's a careful kind of phrasing, and Mitch isn't sure if he's annoyed or grateful. "Yeah," he says noncommittally. "I'm fine, Patty. No need to call in reinforcements."

"Okay," Nolan says easily. "Let me know if you change your mind."

Mitch turns to look at him more fully. Nolan still hasn't looked in Mitch's direction, and it would be odd if Mitch hadn't already taken note of the way he almost never looks away from TK. "Didn't know you were so firmly on my side in this."

Nolan shrugs. "TK's on your side," he says. "If there are sides, I mean. I'm not sure there are, but I'm following his lead on this one."

"Thanks, I guess," Mitch says. He's not sure how much having Nolan Patrick in his corner is going to help him, or if he's going to need that help, but it probably won't come around to bite him in the ass.

"No problem," Nolan says, finally turning to shoot Mitch a brief smile. "Let's kick ass, eh?"

"That's the plan," Mitch agrees.

Nolan skates away, and Mitch makes himself re-join practice. He's played through some seriously distracting shit before; he can absolutely ignore everything until he's off the ice, and he can figure out how to keep ignoring it once he's had a shower and some carbs. 

He has no idea why he ever thought it would be that easy, but he kicks himself for it when he's sitting in the dining hall with Mo on one side of him and Conor Timmins on the other. It feels like he's got some sort of invisible defenseman barrier around him—or, actually, a very visible one, even if it's not one he asked for or even particularly appreciates. He gets that Mo is trying to help and that Timmins is going along with it, but honestly, it's hard to try to ignore something when you have two huge guys sitting next to you to serve as constant visual reminders.

He manages to escape, pleading exhaustion and managing to ungracefully turn down Mo's offer of a roommate swap by just getting up and leaving. He's going to go back to his room and pray that Dylan's not there right now, because he just needs a few minutes of quiet to figure out how he's going to pretend he's not full of feelings and feelings-adjacent exhaustion while remembering how to breathe until the tournament is over. It's not like he thought that the Olympics would be a walk in the park, but this is above and beyond anything he figured would happen.

It feels a little ridiculous for him to knock on his own hotel room door, but if Dylan's in there, Mitch has plans to find an empty lounge somewhere in the hotel and hide until he gets a handle on himself. Luckily for him, there's no answer, and when he cautiously lets himself inside, it's to a dark, empty room. He lets out a sigh of relief as he closes the door behind him; he briefly entertains the thought of putting a sock on the door, but he actually enjoys not being seventeen anymore, and the look on Dylan's face the first time Mitch had pulled that on him is a good enough memory for now.

Mitch takes a long, hot shower, then changes into a Knights tee shirt he would never admit to still travelling with and sits on his bed. He takes a deep breath, ready to confront everything that's been swirling in his head all day, which is of course when the door opens and Dylan walks in.

"Uh," Dylan says, looking at him. "Are you... I can go?"

Mitch sighs. "I'm going to be incredibly, aggressively normal," he says, and it's like his whole body warms up to the idea as he says it out loud. "We're teammates. I knew how to be friends with you once. We can make this work for the length of one Olympics."

Dylan blinks at him. "Wait, just like that?"

"I know most of our early interactions are going to work against me here, but I don't actually like making things more difficult than they have to be," Mitch says, feeling the ghost of a smile cross his face. "I want to win; you want to win. That can be enough, I think."

"I'm glad," Dylan says, simple and honest, and the look he gives Mitch is relieved in a way Mitch doesn't know how to process. "I'm gonna grab a shower, but would you be up for some Parks and Rec? I want to rewatch the whole thing before the reboot starts in the fall, but I haven't actually started yet."

"I still can't believe they're rebooting Parks and Rec," Mitch grumbles. "Leave the classics alone, man."

"Blasphemy," Dylan says, pointing at him. "That's a bad take and you know it."

"No way," Mitch says, glaring a little. "I'll queue it on Netflix. We can watch a few episodes so you can remember how perfect it was the first time, and then we can agree that a reboot is a terrible idea."

"You're on," Dylan says, nodding as if it's a serious challenge instead of them arguing over a stupid television program, and Mitch only lets himself wonder about it for a few seconds as Dylan disappears into the bathroom before shaking his head and pulling up Netflix on his iPad.

-0-

Mitch comes to two very, very sudden realisations when he wakes up in the morning. The first is that he and Dylan must have fallen asleep while watching Parks and Rec the night before, because Mitch's iPad is balancing on the edge of the bed, and Dylan is draped across his chest, breathing softly as he sleeps.

The second is that he doesn't hate this turn of events in the slightest.

Half of Mitch wants to freak out at the realisation; the other half wants to curl into Dylan more fully, to close his eyes and maybe ignore all the shit from the past eight years by remembering how good the handful of years before that had been. He settles for a kind of middle ground instead, settling back into the bed and taking a deep breath before really and truly trying to think everything through.

He hadn't been lying when he'd told Connor that he and Dylan had never dated. They had been incredibly close, and Mitch knows without a doubt that if things had happened a little differently, if Dylan's path to the NHL hadn't been so fraught and Mitch hadn't been so worried about saying and doing everything wrong, that they would have talked about the possibility.

Mitch remembers the draft, hasn't been able to forget the way they'd gone one right after the other, Mitch following Dylan and both of them joking about it after, as if Mitch wouldn't have followed him anywhere right then. He remembers ditching their parents by saying they were going to hang out with their friends, and then ditching their friends by claiming family time; he remembers curling up together in his bed, pressed together all the way up their fronts, the way Dylan had leaned in and kissed him so gently, so hesitantly. They'd made out for what felt like hours, and they'd smiled at each other when they woke up, and Mitch remembers so, so clearly thinking that they'd be able to have this for real and for keeps, that nothing could take it from them.

In the end, he figures, he'd been right. Nothing had taken their chance from them; they'd done that all by themselves.

Dylan hums and drums his fingers against Mitch's chest without opening his eyes. "Stop thinking and cuddle me better."

Mitch lets out a breath and smiles, half because it's so incredibly the Dylan he remembers and half because it's _still_ so incredibly Dylan. "Not gonna freak out that yesterday we could barely talk to each other and today we woke up cuddling?"

"No," Dylan says. He still hasn't really moved, which means that Mitch can feel him smiling through the thin cotton of his shirt. "Remember when we did that article for World Juniors?"

"I will never be allowed to forget that article," Mitch replies. It's fine if he's smiling this much, he reasons, since Dylan's eyes are closed and he can't see it. "I've been asked about it by pretty much every rookie I've ever played with."

"Do you give them a practical demonstration or just tell them to read better?" Dylan asks. "Because there's no substitute for the real thing, man, and you've definitely kept up with your cuddle training."

Mitch rolls his eyes. "I had a girlfriend for six years after I made it with the Leafs. I got a lot of practice in."

Dylan's quiet for a moment. "Sorry about the breakup," he says, and Mitch isn't sure why that makes him finally open his eyes and move away, but he resolutely tells himself not to miss Dylan's warmth. It doesn't work that well.

Mitch shrugs a shoulder, still laying down, and doesn't turn to face Dylan. "Thanks. It sucked, but it's fine now. She's way happier with her new girlfriend than I think she ever was with me."

"Wait, she has a girlfriend?" Dylan asks. The bed creaks like he's sitting up, but Mitch isn't going to look. He can do this. "That's... I didn't know that."

"Bisexual people," Mitch says, waving a hand around. "We find each other sometimes."

"Dude, my radar has not gotten any better," Dylan says, and the bed moves when he flops back down. "You want to know something sad? Matthew Tkachuk has better queer radar than I do."

"Chucky is almost offensively straight," Mitch says. He can't help it; he has to turn just so he can stare at Dylan. "How did you manage that?"

"He just _knows_ ," Dylan says expressively. "I honestly double-check with him before I hit on someone now, because I'm wrong almost every time. I've gotten turned down more for barking up the wrong tree than I have because the person wasn't interested."

"I can't decide if that's sad or hilarious," Mitch decides.

Dylan turns and gives him a lopsided grin. "Why not both?"

"Fair," Mitch says with a laugh. "We should probably start getting ready for practice. Gotta show all those kids on this team the kind of magic we can make."

"Brave of you to assume we've still got it," Dylan says.

Mitch snorts. "I know the level I can play at, and I've seen some of your highlights. I'm sure we can make something happen."

Dylan's face does something odd, but smoothes over before Mitch can figure out what it is. "Checking up on me, Marner?"

"Your face keeps popping up on TSN," Mitch says, sighing dramatically. "I didn't have time to miss you, because it was like you were never gone."

He regrets it pretty much as he's saying it; it's the kind of thing that would be funny with almost anyone else, but the history between them is still there even if they're pretending it isn't, and Mitch is wincing just as much as Dylan is by the time he finishes the sentence. He opens his mouth to apologise, but Dylan shakes his head, so he drops it.

"Practice," Dylan says, finally rolling towards the edge of the bed. "Magic. Let's get to it."

"You take the first shower," Mitch says, waving at the bathroom. "I'll be nice this morning."

"I'm gonna use, like, all the hot water," Dylan warns as he walks towards the door.

Mitch rolls his eyes. "Yeah, I didn't forget your thing about trying to boil yourself in the shower. Go for it."

"If my skin isn't red, the water's too cold," Dylan says, grinning at Mitch before shutting the bathroom door.

Mitch studiously ignores all the thoughts his brain is trying to present when the water turns on.

-0-

Not that Mitch is shocked, but he and Dylan fit back together like they've been playing on a line for their entire careers. It's easy to find him, to know where he's going to be and get to where Dylan knows he can get to, and it's not that every single pass connects or that they score on every line rush, but it's good. It's great.

"Fuck, I love hockey," Dylan says, mouthguard hanging out of his mouth as he crashes into Mitch's side in an exaggerated celly after they score on an empty net. "How did we never manage to sign with the same team?"

"You're allergic to Toronto," Mitch says, wrapping an arm around Dylan's waist as they go spinning a little. "You told me it gives you hives." Granted, that had been a lifetime ago, the two of them sitting quietly together over a glitching FaceTime call in the dregs of another February in juniors, Dylan blurting out that he'd love to be in Mitch's shoes but hate it just as much, the weight and expectations of a hockey-crazy market sitting on his shoulders.

"I'd get an EpiPen," Dylan says. They're not moving anymore and it should feel weird, probably, the two of them clinging to each other somewhere to the left of the net, leaned in close while the rest of their team goes on with practice around them. There _is_ something weird about it, but it's more in the way Dylan's eyes crinkle at the corners when he grins down at Mitch than anything else, and—

Mitch is ignoring a lot of things this Olympics, is maybe his main takeaway from the whole thing.

There's a bunch of team stuff to do for the rest of the day, bonding activities and video review and a coach's meeting that's all about believing in themselves but also listening to everything the coaches have to tell them. It's pretty normal for international tournaments, and it's easy to fall back into it, jostling with the younger guys on the team and trying to pick apart Slovakia's defense all while doing his best to avoid the hell out of Connor.

"Hey," Mitch hears as he's leaving the coaching meeting, and well, there goes that hope. "Marns, c'mon, wait up."

"Davo," Mitch says, because he knows better than to blow off the captain in public. "What's up?"

Connor gives him a flat look, but he also glances around; at least he's aware of the situation too. "Can we talk?"

"Ohhhh, Marns is in _trouble_ ," one of the guys chirps as more of their teammates pour from the room.

Mitch rolls his eyes and forces a smile. "Sure, man," he says, trying not to hunch his shoulders. "Dining hall?"

"Mitch," Connor says quietly, and Mitch sighs.

"Fine," he says, not bothering to force any happiness into his voice. "I'll follow you. Lead the way."

They're quiet on the walk to Connor's hotel room; Mitch isn't going to give him an opening, but it doesn't look like Connor is actually looking for one. It's not that far a walk, anyway, and Connor's got his own room, so they don't have to worry about anyone else barging in. Benefits of being the captain, Mitch figures.

Connor lets them in, then gestures towards the bed. "You can sit."

"Should I plan on staying?" Mitch asks, keeping eye contact with Connor. "Because I'm kind of feeling like standing is the better option."

Connor sighs. "I wanted to—"

Someone bangs on the door, and Conor jerks and turns. "Uh."

Mitch gestures at it. "You should get that," he says mildly. "Captain."

"Yeah," Connor says, glancing at Mitch and then back to the door. He's still pretty close to it, so he takes the two steps back towards it and opens the door.

"We need to talk," Dylan says flatly from the other side.

"Hey, Stromer," Mitch calls, because fuck if he's letting this golden opportunity slip right out of his hands. "I got called to the principal's office. Are you here to rescue me?"

Dylan's face cycles through surprise and anger before landing on determination. He raises both eyebrows at Connor, then pushes past him into the room. "Marns," he says. "Didn't think I'd be meeting you here."

Mitch spreads his hands. "Same."

"Guys," Connor says, shutting the door again. "I'm not here to make your lives more difficult—"

Mitch and Dylan snort in eerie near-perfect unison.

"I'm just trying to help," Connor insists.

Mitch turns to Dylan. "I already told him what I thought about him _helping,_ so if you want to take this one..."

"Fuck off, Davo," Dylan says bluntly. "Seriously. We're goddamned adults, and you're treating us like we're your toddlers."

"I'm not," Connor protests. "I just want to—"

"—assume that we can't make decisions about who we want to be friends with on our own?" Mitch cuts in. "Or, wait. You want to fix what you see as a problem but the people involved have learned to live with at this point?"

Connor deflates. "If it was me," he says quietly, "and I had some huge blowup with—with Leon or someone, would you guys just let it go?"

"If you asked us to, absolutely," Dylan says immediately. "If you wanted help, I'd be there, but if you wanted me to keep my nose out of it, that's what I'd do. That's basic friendship rules."

"You're both my friends," Connor says. "It sucks that you can barely be in a room with each other anymore."

Mitch spreads his hands. "Congratulations," he deadpans. "We're on the same side right now, since we're both pissed at you. Mission accomplished."

"Honestly, Davo, it's a good thing you pulled this bullshit on us," Dylan says. Mitch turns to him, eyebrows already up, but Dylan's looking at Connor. "Can you imagine if this backfired on you?"

"It's not _not_ backfiring on me," Connor says, looking between the two of them. "This wasn't in the plan."

"You're still a meddler, and I don't forgive you," Mitch says. "But we're going to be fine for the Olympics, because it's the goddamn Olympics, and we can talk about it after. Okay?"

Connor opens his mouth, then glances at Dylan. Mitch doesn't want to glance over, so he has no idea what Dylan's doing with his face, but it makes Connor's mouth snap shut, so Mitch is going to take it. "Fine," he says sullenly. "We'll talk about it after."

Mitch nods. "Good enough for me," he says. "So unless there was something else you wanted to talk to me about..."

"I mean, I'm done," Dylan says. "Connor?"

"Go away," Connor says, and there's something really childish about it, but more in a nostalgic way than a harsh way. Mitch doesn't smile, but he almost feels like he wants to as he walks out the door.

Dylan follows him out and down the hallway, but he doesn't say anything until they're safely back in their own room. "Jesus."

"He's a lot," Mitch agrees, sighing. "I almost feel bad about being a dick to him, but I also don't want him sticking his nose into my life all the time, y'know?"

"Trust me, I know," Dylan says, groaning as he flops down onto Mitch's bed. "Sometimes his overprotective dad side comes out, but it's really only cute when it's around the twins."

Mitch snorts. "I kind of figured that Nuge would be the chill dad, but I had no idea how right I would be."

"So, so right," Dylan says. "Hopefully the kids inherited his calm and not Davo's neuroses."

"I'm not sure that's how genetics work," Mitch says, sitting next to Dylan.

"Nature and nurture," Dylan says, shrugging and messing the covers up. "I feel like that's what my mom would say to that."

Mitch grins. "How _is_ Trish?"

"Awesome, as always," Dylan says, the fond look that he gets around his family stealing over his face. "She's loving being a grandma. Matty's kids are really cute, and Ryan's are starting to play competitively."

"Nice," Mitch says, smiling as he lays back, not quite touching Dylan but not too far from it. "You have photos?"

"Of course I have photos," Dylan says, yanking his phone out of his pocket. "Let me know when you're sick of the photos, okay? I can go on for a while."

Mitch just smiles and settles in.

-0-

Mitch swears he's not going to get used to waking up with Dylan wrapped around him, but here he is, day two of twenty at the Olympics, and he's already way more comfortable with the prospect than he ever would have thought he could be.

"Hey," Mitch says, nudging Dylan with his elbow. He's trying not to catalogue things that have changed and things that haven't, but Dylan is still the deepest sleeper that Mitch has ever met. "Stromer."

Dylan whines and burrows closer.

Mitch counts to three, breathing evenly, and then tilts his head down. "Dylan."

"Hmm," Dylan says, drowsy but starting to actually wake up.

"Gotta wake up, man," Mitch says. His arm is wrapped around Dylan's shoulders, holding him close, and Mitch sternly tells his fingers to uncurl from Dylan's triceps. He taps at Dylan's elbow instead. "Breakfast."

"I'm not hungry, I'm warm," Dylan says, and Mitch grins.

"You can be both," he says replies. "Don't make me pull the covers off, man, come on. You'll be pissy all day."

Dylan finally sighs and tilts his head up, and they're so, so close, Dylan sleep-bleary and hair a mess as he looks up at Mitch. "Ugh."

"I'll shower first and let you have ten minutes, but you need to be up when I get out," Mitch says. "We can't skip team breakfast."

"Ugh," Dylan repeats with more feeling. He turns his head and rubs his face against Mitch's sleep shirt, then pushes himself back. "I'm up. If you get out of bed and leave me sleeping, there's no way I'll get out of bed in time for breakfast."

"You can shower first if that's better," Mitch offers.

Dylan shakes his head. "I'm good now," he says, stretching. "Man, is it me, or are these beds really comfortable?"

Mitch bites his tongue so he doesn't point out that Dylan's spent the past two nights sleeping solidly on Mitch more than the bed. "They're not bad," he says after a moment. "Better than hotel beds in Anaheim."

Dylan makes an affronted noise. "Nothing in the world is worse than Anaheim's hotel beds," he declares. "It's insulting to think that these beds are even in the same universe as those."

"I'm sorry, bed," Mitch says solemnly, patting the sheets.

Dylan grins at him. He opens his mouth like he's going to say something, but snaps it closed a second later. "Uh," he says, glancing away. "Shower?"

Mitch is torn between pressing him on whatever he was going to say and really, really not wanting to know. He doesn't wrestle with it for long before getting out of bed. "Shower," he says, moving towards the bathroom. If Dylan wants him to know, he'll change his mind and tell Mitch whatever it was, he reasons.

The shower goes a long way towards getting Mitch ready for the day, and by the time he gets dressed and runs a comb through his hair, he's excited to see what the day will bring. They've got team breakfast and then more video review, but there are a few free hours this afternoon before they have to get ready for the opening ceremony, and Mitch has plans to do some exploring.

"Where are you going?" Cozens, one of the younger guys who Mitch doesn't know very well, asks. "Like, I know you know some local guys. Did you get any tips?"

Mitch rolls his eyes. "I'm not going to ask William Nylander to take a break from his Olympic training to give me tourist tips," he says. "I Googled, though, and there's some cool stuff to see downtown, and a couple of museums. I figure I'll go to whichever one is closest when I get too cold to stay outside anymore."

"ABBA museum," someone shouts, and the end of video review descends into the mild kind of chaos that is a group of hockey players finding their voices after the coach leaves the vicinity.

"I'm not going to the ABBA museum," Mitch says to Cozens, who grins at him.

"That's because you're no fun," Cozens says loftily, standing and clapping him on the shoulder. "Good luck with your walking tour of frigid Sweden, man."

"Good luck getting _Dancing Queen_ unstuck from your brain," Mitch replies, getting up. He's got plans, and he's going to see how much ridiculous touristy stuff he can cram into his afternoon.

"Hey," Mitch hears, and when he turns, Patrick Marleau is smiling at him. "Would it be weird to invite myself along now that I'm coaching?"

"Anything for you, Dad," Mitch says, grinning. "Man, I feel like I haven't seen you in forever. Come walk around with me and tell me how the kids are doing."

It's fun to tour Stockholm with Patty and hear stories about the family that Mitch misses like he misses his own; Landon is in college now, and Mitch protests loudly when Patty tells him that Brody has a pretty steady girlfriend. "He and Steph are still friends, which is pretty funny for everyone involved," Patty adds.

Mitch has to laugh at that. "She loved your kids," he says, because it's true, and he and Steph are pretty much friends again by this point. "I'm glad she kept in touch."

"I'm sorry it didn't work out," Patty says sympathetically. "We all thought you were going to get married, and then..."

Mitch winces. "Yeah, that's... on me," he says. "She's happy now, though, and that's great. She's an amazing person."

"She is," Patty says. He hesitates a moment, then asks, "So, anyone new in your life these days?"

"You're not actually my dad," Mitch says, groaning. He wants to smile, to play it off, but his mind is churning through still frames of Dylan curled up against his chest, Dylan's eyes crinkling at the corners when he laughs, Dylan, Dylan, Dylan. "There's not... I'm not dating anyone."

"Okay," Patty says, and it's not like he hasn't always had the perfect dad voice, but he's really got it down now. "Is that the whole story?"

"Is that ever the whole story?" Mitch asks, smiling briefly. He stops walking and shakes his head. "It's... I don't know whether to say it's complicated or it's nothing."

"If those are the options, then I'd go with complicated," Patty says mildly, coming to a stop beside him.

Mitch barks out a laugh. "D'you remember the middle of your second year with us? I had... a breakup, kind of, except not an actual breakup."

"You had a friend who was going through something," Patty says, frowning as he remembers. "And you fought about it."

"I haven't really talked to him since," Mitch says. "Except now I'm rooming with him."

Patty doesn't say anything, and when Mitch turns to look at him, he's definitely wearing a Dad Face. "If it's uncomfortable..."

"Of course it's uncomfortable," Mitch says, squeezing his eyes shut. "We both decided to kind of forget that we weren't friends anymore while we were here, and I'm forgetting it too well."

"You have feelings," Patty guesses.

"Don't I always?" Mitch asks wryly as he opens his eyes again. "It's complicated, but it's also not really anything. We're temporarily friends, and then we'll go back to both just being guys who play in the NHL."

"You're allowed to make up with people, Mitchy," Patty says. "And you're allowed to be the first one to reach out."

"That's terrifying, though," Mitch says, smiling. "I'm just gonna survive the Olympics, and then I'll be back in Toronto and I won't have to worry about any of this anymore."

"If that's what you want, then go for it," Patty says. he starts walking again, and Mitch follows. "But if it isn't, then you have to promise me you'll try to make a change."

"You were always a dad, but when did you turn into _that_ dad?" Mitch asks. He's only half teasing.

Patty rolls his eyes. "Caleb went through a phase," he says, and as he launches into another story, Mitch puts his hands in his pockets and smiles.

-0-

They blow Finland out of the water in the first game of the preliminary round, and Mitch can't lie to himself about it: winning at the Olympics feels _incredible_.

"Holy shit," someone yells in the locker room, and yeah, Mitch can relate. He knows he's smiling a little too widely for comfort, but they just won 7-1 against an incredible team at the freaking _Olympics_. He's gonna keep on smiling, sue him.

"Boys, we are celebrating tonight," Timmins calls out, and the room breaks into loud whoops.

"But not too hard," Patty yells, cutting through the noise. "We have practice in the morning, and it was a great win, but there's a long way to go."

"The season is a marathon, not a sprint," Mitch adds, because he's heard it from every coach at every level. "Even a short, weird season like the Olympics."

"Spoilsport," Dylan says form his stall, a few down from where Mitch is seated. "Sounds like the first round is on Marns."

Mitch flips him the middle finger easily, and everyone laughs before breaking off into their own conversations. It's habit to finish getting changed without thinking about too much else, and by the time he's tying his shoelaces and sitting back into his stall, Dylan is standing in front of him with an easy smile on his face. "Hey," he says, voice low. "I know I kind of threw you under the bus with the drinks thing, but how would you feel about skipping the bar and watching more Parks and Rec instead?"

"Sounds good to me," Mitch replies, smiling up at him. He turns and scans the room, "Hey, Cozens," he calls, waiting until Cozens turns and raises an eyebrow at him. "Davo's good for that round I was supposed to buy, and don't let him tell you he isn't."

"Drinks on the captain," Cozens yells immediately, winking at Mitch, and the rest of the team picks up the cheer.

Connor throws Mitch a dirty look, but Mitch raises both eyebrows and holds eye contact. He's not mad at Connor anymore, not really, but that doesn't mean Connor doesn't owe him a little payback. If Mitch can collect some of that in drinks for the rest of the team, well. Team first, or something. It doesn't take Connor long to roll his eyes and glance away, and if there's anything arguing with his cat growing up had taught Mitch, it's that that means he won this round.

Connor catches Mitch on his way out of the locker room. "You guys aren't going to kill each other or anything, right?" he asks warily, glancing from Mitch to Dylan, who's still standing by his stall, laughing with Sam Girard about something. 

"We made a solemn pact to murder each other and lie to your face about how we were thinking about it beforehand," Mitch says without missing a beat. "You wanted us to be friends again, and now you want details? Call your husband if you're that hard up for warm fuzzies."

"Warm fuzzies," Connor echoes. "I have two toddlers and I can tell you for a fact that I've never used the phrase 'warm fuzzies' until today."

"You learn something new every day, bud," Mitch says. "Go buy the kids some drinks. Make sure they don't drown each other in booze before we have to play again."

"I'd ask if we were ever that young, but unfortunately, the internet won't let me forget anything about the draft footage," Connor mutters. "If you kill each other, I'll kill you myself, got it?"

Mitch blinks at him a few times. "Go get a drink," he finally says. "You need it."

"Yeah, go away," Dylan adds, coming up behind Mitch. "We're gonna make our own fun."

"Gross," Girard comments as he passes them. "I thought I wouldn't hear that at the Olympics, since Comphs and Josty are back home, but you are just as bad."

"They're not making out in supply closets," MacKinnon calls from across the room. "Could be worse."

"We're not making out _anywhere_ ," Mitch says firmly. "We're watching Parks and Rec."

"Call it whatever you want, dudes, just keep it out of the supply closets," MacKinnon replies, shrugging. "And the showers. And the—"

"Wow, I'm glad I've never played in Colorado," Dylan says under his breath.

"No kidding," Mitch agrees. He raises his voice. "Okay, got it, thanks."

"Or the dining hall," MacKinnon adds, apparently on a roll now. "Like, even semi-public is still too public, okay?"

Dylan grabs Mitch's arm. "We're leaving now. Enjoy your drinks, man, and good luck when you get back home, I guess."

"Or the team bus," MacKinnon says, mostly to himself. "That one was bad."

"Yikes," Mitch comments as they walk out. "That's just a whole big yikes right there, I think."

"Agreed," Dylan says, shaking his head. "What the hell is in the water in Colorado?"

"Pride flags," Mitch guesses. "Paper hearts."

Dylan snorts. "Apparently."

They walk in a comfortable kind of silence back towards their room; it's weird, Mitch thinks, how easy it is to fall back into things with Dylan if they just step right over all the hurt between them. He's pretty sure he's going to break his own heart at the end of the tournament, but Future Mitch can curse him all he wants as long as Current Mitch gets to have this.

Dylan unlocks their door and Mitch follows him in, and they kick their shoes off in a jumbled pile near the door. Dylan tumbles in a heap into Mitch's bed, and it's an incredibly inviting picture, the way he curls up but leaves a space for Mitch. It takes a lot of willpower for Mitch to walk over and sit down beside him. His iPad is on the bedstand, and he reaches out and puts his hand on it, then looks down at Dylan. "Hey."

"Hey," Dylan says, looking up at him. "What, not in the mood for Netflix anymore?"

It's like the perfect storm of stupid inconsequential events: the light coming through the window and highlighting Dylan's hair, the tiny freckles across the bridge of his nose, the way his eyelashes flutter a little when he glances up through them, how Mitch's heart is beating too wildly in his chest.

"Can I," Mitch asks, feeling frozen, feeling like time is maybe rushing on around him while he sits here and watches dust motes fall through the air. He swallows, feeling it click past the lump in his throat. "Dyls."

Dylan inhales softly, but his attention is one hundred percent on Mitch now. "Mitchy."

"This is a bad idea," Mitch says, testing the words out. They don't feel untrue, but— "I don't really care that it's a bad idea. Do you?"

Dylan shakes his head, a barely-there side-to-side motion. "Don't care at all," he says, voice quiet. He tilts his head up a little. "C'mon."

Mitch moves his hand from the iPad to the bed beside Dylan's shoulder, bracing himself as he leans in. He stops with his face a few inches from Dylan's, looking down for a few seconds before slowly leaning the rest of the way in. It's soft, tentative, more a brush of lips than a real kiss, and Mitch doesn't make the decision to close his eyes as much as he realises that he's already done it, pulling back a fraction of an inch and waiting, testing the silence and the stillness and this new version of the present where he's kissed Dylan again and the world kept turning.

"Mitch," Dylan whispers, something Mitch feels as much as he sees. His fingers curl around Mitch's hip, and Mitch shivers. "Kiss me again. Please."

Mitch isn't thinking about the part where his heart is going to get broken as he leans back in, because all he can think is _finally_.

-0-

They connect incredibly well in practice the next day.

They _light it up_ against Switzerland the day after that.

MacKinnon bumps Mitch's shoulder on the ice as they're all slowly skating towards DiPietro to congratulate him on the shutout. "Whatever you're actually doing when you say you're watching Parks and Rec with Stromer," he says, "keep doing it, man."

Mitch flushes as red as his jersey, and he hopes that he can blame it on exertion from the game, btu MacKinnon snickers. "It's Netflix," Mitch lies, refusing to turn and look MacKinnon in the eye.

"Sure," MacKinnon says peaceably. He doesn't say anything else, which actually makes Mitch brace himself, because whatever comes out of MacKinnon's mouth next is probably going to be a doozy. He keeps quiet, though, all the way through the line and then back into the locker room, and Mitch lets his guard down.

Rookie mistake, he realises as he watches MacKinnon walk over to Dylan's stall. He claps Dylan on the shoulder, then says, loudly enough that they can probably hear him over the showers, "Keep up the victory boning, man, it's the magic we need."

The team dissolves into whoops and catcalls as Mitch makes his way to his stall, refusing to make eye contact with anyone in the room. There sure as hell hadn't been anything that could be described as _boning_ going on, but they have yet to use more than one bed, and neither of them had even mentioned Netflix when they'd gone back to their room last night, opting instead to curl into bed together and pick up the making out where they'd left off the night before.

It's good. It's nice. It's all pretend, and Mitch has to remind himself of that over and over again as he strips out of his gear and heads into the shower. It has an expiration date, and then he and Dylan are going to go back to being slightly friendlier quasi-strangers than they'd been before this whole thing started.

"Hey," Dylan says, appearing at Mitch's side when they're both mostly dressed. "Dinner?"

Mitch gives him what he hopes isn't a shaky smile. "Can't right now," he says, grabbing his phone and waving it vaguely. "I told Matts I'd meet up with him tonight."

Dylan nods, and his tone stays light. "No making out with the enemy, Marns."

"Been there, done that, not looking for a repeat," Mitch says, pulling a face. It's his standard response to the question of hooking up with Auston; just because they're both into guys doesn't mean they're into each other, and sure, they'd gone there, but they'd both decided that being friends was more important than trying to make it work through "the weird and awkward transition stage between hands off and full homo," as Auston had so eloquently put it.

That gets a slight smile out of Dylan, at least. "I'll see you later, then," he says, backing up a few steps. Mitch nods, and Dylan hesitates there for a second before nodding back and walking away.

 _not nuclear option but can we get food,_ Mitch texts when Dylan walks out of the dressing room.

It takes Auston a few minutes to answer. _yeah no prob see u soon_

Mitch breathes out a sigh of relief as he stands up and heads for the door. In the cosmic ranking of best friends, he's pretty sure his is up near the top.

He's got time to find a table and fiddle with his phone for a minute before Auston slides into the seat across from him. "Hey," he says, voice the same almost-monotone it always is.

It's comforting, Mitch thinks as he gives Auston a smile that feels a little tired around the edges. "Hey."

Auston's eyes widen fractionally. "Whoa," he says, leaning in a little. "Something happened. What happened?"

Mitch laughs, small and unsure. "I might have done something dumb."

"You hooked up with Stromer," Auston says immediately. His voice isn't too flat or too judgy or too... anything, Mitch thinks. It's just Auston's voice, starting a fact. Or, well, what he thinks is a fact.

"Not exactly," Mitch hedges.

"Not yet," Auston translates. He leans back. "Huh. I have to say, man, I didn't see this one coming. Not after..."

"We both agreed to just kind of table the whole thing," Mitch says, leaning forward so he can rest his head on his hand. "For team unity. And now I think we might have tabled it a little too well, because we've been sharing a bed and making out before we fall asleep, and I keep thinking about how great it is just to have him for half a month and trying to ignore how shitty it's going to be when we leave Sweden and reality hits us both again."

"Mitchy," Auston says, sighing. "Buddy. I need you to promise me something, and it's important."

Mitch tilts his head so he can see Auston and raises an eyebrow.

"Don't sleep with him until you have a conversation about what happened," Auston says, simple and steady. "There's a lot of shit you're both putting to the side. Just because you're on good terms right now doesn't mean you should do anything serious while you're faking being okay."

Mitch closes his eyes and turns his head back towards the table. "I was afraid you were going to say that."

Auston laughs a little. "You _knew_ I was going to say that," he says. "After all the stuff you told me when I was working my shit out with Hanny, you had to actually know."

"I did," Mitch says, shaking his head slightly before sitting up and looking at Auston. "It's probably what I actually wanted you to say in the first place."

"Probably," Auston agrees. "You gonna promise me? You don't have to, but you really should."

"I promise," Mitch says. "Gonna be honest, though. I might decide it's not worth the conversation and just avoid sleeping with him."

"You definitely won't," Auston says, amused. "You're welcome to try, though."

Mitch scowls at him, and Auston's grin widens. Sometimes, Mitch reflects as he feels his own expression melt into a grudging smile, having someone around who knows you so well is both a blessing and a curse.

-0-

They win against Sweden, and then they win against Germany. It's delirious, the cycle of sleep-practice-sleep-game, but they keep rolling through it and keep coming out on top. Through it all, Mitch keeps making out with Dylan. He does not bring this up, not with Dylan or with anyone else. Dylan clearly already knows and is super on board, and he can avoid Auston for now, and nobody else needs to know.

For some reason, he didn't count on Dylan being the one to bring it up. He's got no idea how he made such a blatant miscalculation, but when Dylan closes the door to their hotel room gently and turns to look at Mitch, it's like Mitch already knows what he's about to say.

"We should talk about this," Dylan says, not moving away from the door, and yeah, Mitch called that one.

He gives Dylan what he knows is a weak attempt at a smile. "Matts has been pushing me to do that, yeah."

Dylan laughs. "Brinksy's been nagging me, too," he admits. "What's with Americans and talking about their feelings?"

"I pushed Matts into it with Hanny, and I feel like he's been looking for revenge opportunities ever since," Mitch says with a grin. "As if they're not happily engaged now. Come on, I did them such a favour."

"You're good like that," Dylan says, smiling back. "A good friend."

"I've gotten better at it," Mitch says, letting the smile slip off his face. "I know what happened was on me just as much as you. I didn't want it to happen again, so I tried to make sure it wouldn't."

Dylan sighs. "Can we sit? I think I'd rather be sitting for this."

"Yeah, let's," Mitch says. He goes over and sits on his own bed, and there's an unpleasant twisting in his gut when Dylan sits on what is technically his own bed. They're over a week into this now, and it's the first time since that first day that either of them has touched the other bed. It's a sign that they actually need to have this conversation, Mitch tells himself firmly. Anxiety is sometimes just his body's internal adulting meter going off.

"I projected a lot of my issues onto you," Dylan says without preamble when they're both seated. "It was shitty and stupid and really unfair of me, and I'm sorry."

Mitch blinks. "Wow. Um."

Dylan laughs, short and small, and pushes a hand through his hair. "I've been to therapy," he says. "More than once. It helps to have someone to talk to, and it really super extra helps if they know the words for what you're doing and can explain it all to you."

"So I should call someone other than Matts, is what you're telling me," Mitch says, smiling briefly. "That's, uh. I actually should probably do that, because all I have in mind here is to say that I should have called you sooner. I should have made you more of a priority than I did, and by the time I reached out, I didn't know _how_ to reach out."

"No, I get that," Dylan says. "You were trying to check in with me, but it had been so long since we'd talked that you didn't know where I was. And I was enough of a time bomb at that point that most things would have landed wrong, but it felt..."

"Felt how?" Mitch asks. He probably doesn't want to hear it, but this is part of clearing the air, he thinks.

"It felt like you were doing it because you thought you had to, and not because you gave a shit about the answer," Dylan says, a little too fast like he doesn't normally speak anymore, like he still had back when this whole thing happened. "And I reacted like you were calling me out on everything that I thought was wrong with me at that point."

Mitch curls his hand into a fist, digging the tips of his fingers into the skin of his palm. "I didn't mean to," he says quietly. "I never meant to make you feel like I didn't care, or that I thought anything bad about you."

"I know that now," Dylan says. "I've known that for a while, I guess, but it didn't feel like it mattered, because I remember how the whole fight ended, and I didn't think I had any kind of right to try to talk to you after that."

Mitch winces. The fight had ended with Dylan telling Mitch not to call him again if all he was going to do was rub Dylan's misery in his face, and Mitch had replied that he'd reach out if he ever felt like Dylan deserved a chance to figure out whether or not he thought Dylan was worth forgiving for the bullshit he was spewing. It had been way too much on both of their parts, but regretting the words instantly didn't mean that they hadn't happened.

"And then you got here," Mitch says, gesturing to their hotel room. "And you walked in and saw me, and since I never tried to get in touch..."

Dylan's smile is lopsided. "Part of me figured that you didn't mean it, just like I didn't mean it," he says. "Or, like, I meant it in the moment, but I regretted it super fast. But I saw you and I remembered that phone call, and I could only think about how you maybe still hated me, and how I probably deserved it."

"Dylan," Mitch says. He uncurls his fist and reaches out, but the beds are too far apart for them to touch, and the moment feels fragile enough that standing might break it. "I didn't hate you. I was miserable that we weren't friends anymore, and I was confused, and we were _kids_ , holy shit."

"I'm pretty sure being 21 means you don't count as a kid anymore, actually," Dylan says, and his smile gets a little fuller, a little more whole. "I'm pretty sure that's what, like, every law in the States about drinking is all about, actually."

"We were young enough," Mitch counters. "I was—there was part of me that thought we'd figure out how to make _us_ work, even though there was never really an _us_. And then, when we fought, it was..."

"Like the sky was falling," Dylan supplies. "Maybe we _were_ kids."

"I think we were close enough," Mitch says. "For what it's worth, I forgive you for everything, all of it. And I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry, too," Dylan says immediately. "And I forgive you."

Mitch smiles and hopes it doesn't actually wobble, because he feels like he's too full of emotions right now, and he's not quite sure how to convince himself that they're all worth smiling about. "Is this the part where we hug it out?"

"Oh my god, yes," Dylan says, and he gets up and crosses the space between them in a few easy steps, and then he's leaning down and pulling Mitch into his arms.

It's maybe the best hug in the world.

-0-

There are team bonding things and practices between the end of the preliminary round and the start of the knockout round, but Mitch manages to find time to meet up with Auston.

"Hey," Auston greets. He glances up at the sign on the building they're standing in front of. "The ABBA museum? Really?"

"Shut your whole face," Mitch says, jabbing him in the chest. "Also, don't tell the Team Canada children. I told them I wasn't coming here."

Auston snorts. "And they bought it? Amateurs."

Mitch grins and bumps their shoulders together as they walk inside. "How's your team? Anything fun happening?"

Auston groans a little. "Tkachuks are happening," he says. "They've got some sort of competition thing going on with Jack Hughes, and I've made the decision to not get involved at all. I don't need to know, and I _extra_ don't _want_ to know."

"Tkachuks keep happening," Mitch agrees. "It's kind of their thing."

They pay the entry fee and wander a little; Mitch isn't usually a huge museum guy, but he likes seeing things about the places he visits, and ABBA is one of the only things he really associates with Sweden. It makes sense to come here, to walk around with Auston while neither of them really says much, listening to the song samples and reading little plaques on the walls.

"So," Auston says about half an hour into their mostly-quiet museum visit. "Not that this isn't fun, but why'd you want to meet up in a place where our teammates probably won't be around to overhear us?"

Mitch scowls. "Maybe I wanted to share this musical adventure with my buddy. This is _art_ , Auston."

They're standing next to a display comparing the _Mamma Mia_ movies to the live musical, and Auston turns to survey it for a few seconds before turning back to Mitch. "Okay," he says, tone clearly conveying that he doesn't buy it.

"Weird art," Mitch concedes. "I talked to Stromer."

"Good," Auston says. "How'd it go?"

"We both apologised," Mitch says, shrugging and looking back towards the display. "And I think—it was a huge deal at the time, and we both said some pretty awful stuff, but I think it kind of got to be bigger than it really was in my head."

"Could be," Auston says. "I mean, you're allowed to still feel however you feel about it, even if you guys made up. That doesn't mean the stuff in the past didn't happen."

"Stop being wise, it's weird," Mitch says, and Auston snorts. "It's not that I'm forgetting it or whatever, even if that's how this whole thing started. It definitely all happened, and we talked it through. It just... it feels like we just blew up over nothing, and maybe it went the way it did because there were feelings happening on top of us being friends."

Auston makes a noise, somewhere between a hum and a laugh, but when Mitch glances at him there's no expression on his face at all. It's a dead giveaway that he's hiding something, and Mitch narrows his eyes. "What?"

"Just," Auston says, shrugging. "I didn't know if you actually knew you had feelings back then."

Mitch shoves him. "I'm not an idiot," he says. He pauses, waits for Auston to roll his eyes, and adds, "I think I might still have feelings, actually. I'm not convinced they ever went all the way away."

That gets an actual reaction, at least; Auston's eyes widen and he tilts his head to the side. "Really? This whole time?"

"Maybe it's just being together again, talking through our shit," Mitch says, shrugging. "It's not like I've been waiting for him this whole time or anything, but it's... there are definitely feelings. It's just _easy_ with him, Matts."

"That's not a word I have ever once associated with Dylan Strome," Auston says. "Have you talked about that, too? The feelings?"

"No," Mitch says. "Just the stuff that happened in the past. I don't know if I want to bring up the current feelings. All we've done is make out a few times."

"Mitchy," Auston says, and it's the gentle "I'm your best friend, please listen to me" tone of voice. "This got fucked up the first time because neither of you talked your shit out. Maybe, and I'm just putting it out there, but maybe talk to him so you don't get fucked up for another decade?"

Mitch smiles slightly. "I'd like to avoid that, yeah."

"Talk to him again," Auston says simply. "See if you can get everything out in the open this time, man, because me telling you to talk about your feelings is weird for both of us."

"You're not wrong," Mitch says, laughing. "I'll talk to him. No promises that it'll be everything, because that's... kind of a lot of things. I'll try, though."

"That's all I can ask for, I guess," Auston says, shrugging. "Let's do the rest of this museum, okay? I want to see what kind of tacky shit they have in the gift shop. Eichs needs some horrifying ABBA souvenirs to take back to Minnesota with him."

"Sure, man, it's your funeral," Mitch says cheerily. "I bet they have things that sing if you clap near them or whatever. Think he'd like it?"

"I think he'd accidentally-on-purpose leave it in the hotel room," Auston says. "It might still be worth it just for the look on his face, though."

"We have a mission," Mitch says, striding towards the next display. "First we make it through the museum, hopefully without getting any songs stuck in our heads, and then we buy the worst things in the gift shop for Eichs. For _patriotism_."

"Patriotism," Auston echoes, following him. "We're on different national teams, and ABBA is Swedish. How is this patriotic in any way?"

"Determination and grit," Mitch says, unbothered. "C'mon, man, roll with it."

"I'm only going along with this because I want to put something that sings in Eichs' bed and video him rolling over onto it," Auston says as they walk past a glass display case that takes up an entire wall and seems to be filled with different pairs of suede boots. "I'm still objecting to whatever part of this you think is patriotism."

"I can live with that," Mitch decides as they keep walking. "C'mon, we've got a date with some awful gift shop items."

"We do," Auston says, and he's definitely grinning as he follows Mitch, so that's a win.

-0-

The night before they start playing in the medal round probably isn't the best time for this conversation, but Mitch knows himself and he knows the situation, and he's finding out that he still knows Dylan, too, after everything. Clearing the air before they go any further is absolutely the best option, and this conversation is actually somehow less scary than the thought of facing their past had been.

"Hey," Mitch says. Dylan's fresh out of the shower, towel tucked around his waist and skin still slightly red from the heat. He's digging through his drawer in the dresser for sleep shorts, and Mitch looks at him and sees everything he'd seen when they were kids, before they fought, before they drifted apart. He sees more, too: the scar on Dylan's thigh from an errant skate blade after a bad hit while he'd been in Tampa, the way his shoulders sit slightly unevenly from years of leaning over to take faceoffs, the laugh lines around his mouth, his eyes. He looks like everything Mitch has been wanting for years, and it's not that he's afraid to let Dylan know that, but he's really not sure where to start.

"Hey," Dylan says, cutting into Mitch's thoughts. "Nickel for your thoughts."

Mitch blinks at him as he sits on the bed. "Isn't that supposed to be a penny?"

Dylan laughs quietly. "Usually, but it looks like a lot of thoughts."

"I think," Mitch says, looking down into his lap. He doesn't reach out for Dylan's hand, even though he kind of wants to. "I think before, when we were younger? I think I was a little bit in love with you."

"Oh," Dylan says. He doesn't sound surprised, though it's admittedly hard to tell from one word. "I think maybe I was, too."

"And I think," Mitch goes on, making himself look up and say this to Dylan's face. "I think I might still be, at least partially."

"Oh," Dylan says, and this time it's more of a sigh, more of a shock. Mitch can see the words hit and sink in, and then he sees Dylan smile slowly, brilliantly. "Mitch, I thought—I figured you wouldn't want to even talk to me. I thought I'd come here and we'd be, like, awkward teammates at best, and now we're here on the same bed and I get to tell you that even when I was pissed as hell at you, I never stopped being absolutely crazy about you."

Mitch feels like his heart is beating in his throat, his fingers, his legs. "Yeah?" he asks, and he can hear how hopeful he sounds. "So this is... it's not just me."

"It's not just you," Dylan confirms. "Not that I didn't try to move on from a thing we barely even had, but I guess it's sometimes true, what they say about your first love."

"That you don't really move on, not all the way," Mitch says. "I thought that was bullshit, honestly? I loved Steph so much, and it's not like I was lying to myself or to her about that. But we're here now, and it's just..."

"Fate is bullshit," Dylan says when Mitch trails off, "but I sort of feel like I can make an exception to that right now."

Mitch laughs. "Romantic."

"How's this for romantic," Dylan says, smiling, and then he leans in and kisses Mitch, soft and sweet and full of all the promise that Mitch hadn't let himself taste there before.

"A good start," Mitch murmurs against Dylan's mouth when he pulls back. "We should try again, though. Just to make sure you can keep the romance going."

"I can," Dylan says, and it's not full of confident swagger like Mitch had been expecting. It's quiet but sure, something whispered just between the two of them, and all Mitch can do is sink into it.

"Oh, good," Mitch says, just as quiet and just as sure. "I'm really glad to hear that."

Dylan's smile takes up his whole face, forehead crinkling with it as he lets it spread. "I'm really glad about a lot of things right now," he says, and then he leans back in so they can keep kissing each other.

Mitch had kind of thought that this whole talking thing might lead to them sleeping together, as long as it went well, but there's something about the way that it stays pretty PG that feels even better in the moment. He has no doubt that they'll get there, but he curls up in bed with Dylan and doesn't make a move to move things along, not tonight. Dylan seems to be on the same page, and it's easy to let himself get comfortable in the bed and in this new-old thing between them. 

Mitch doesn't remember falling asleep, but he opens his eyes and it's morning. For the first time since they got to Sweden, Dylan's already awake, smiling at Mitch from the other pillow on the bed. "Hi."

"Hi," Mitch replies. He debates it for a few seconds in his head before leaning across the space between them and pressing a kiss to Dylan's cheek. "Sleep well?"

"I did," Dylan says. "Kept having this crazy dream where I told you I was still in love with you and you told me the same thing, and then we made out for a while."

Mitch laughs and stretches. "Weird. Same dream."

"Go figure," Dylan says, laughing a little. "So, uh. We've talked about everything that happened in the past, and we talked about where we are right now, but I want to know where we are moving forward. Is this... do you want to just keep doing this while we're together, or..."

Mitch blinks. "That's not what I want, no," he says. "If you just want it to be an Olympics thing, then I think we should probably—"

"Holy shit, no," Dylan cuts in, and the look on his face is relieved. "I know it's super soon to say anything like this, but I'm in, okay? I'm in, whatever that looks like when we're back on different teams."

Mitch lets out a breath. "Good," he says firmly. "I'm in, too. I don't want to make any promises, but I want to try for real."

"Good," Dylan echoes, smiling and relaxing down into his pillow. "I had another thought while you were sleeping, though. About us, about this."

"Oh?" Mitch asks. "What kind of thought?"

Dylan's grin widens, and Mitch wants to lean up a little bit just so he can see the whole thing, but he resists. "We can _never_ tell Davo that his plan worked," he says.

Mitch starts laughing. "Oh my god, you're so right," he says. "How do we hide it?"

Dylan leans forward and kisses Mitch, feather-light, before pulling back. "On second thought, let him be smug," he says. "I don't want to hide."

"Me neither," Mitch says immediately, reaching out so he can rest his hand on Dylan's hip. "Let's be really loud about it."

Dylan's expression goes thoughtful, then mischievous. "I can think of a way to be loud."

"Oh, can you?" Mitch asks, grinning at him. "Better get over here and show me, then."

"I can do that," Dylan promises, moving across the bed towards Mitch.

Yeah, Mitch thinks as Dylan presses their mouths together, something hungry about it this time. Yeah, they're not going to keep this quiet, not at all.

**EPILOGUE**

A third-round exit is respectable, but it leaves Mitch aching in every way he could possibly imagine. He took a kind of shitty hit from one of Tampa's forwards in round two that he's still feeling, sure, but every time they make it so close and can't manage to close it out makes something bitter rise in the back of his throat. He doesn't watch the Finals, doesn't care if it's San Jose or Carolina raising the Cup if he can't do it himself, so most of his late June is spent pretending hockey doesn't exist.

At least Dylan's in a similar situation; the Flames had lost in the second round to the Kraken, and Dylan's still cranky about it. He'd been home briefly while Mitch was playing the Carolina series, but he'd flown back to Calgary soon after they'd lost Game 7; the Flames aren't bringing him back next year, so he's in the process of packing up his life there and getting ready to send it to whatever city will sign him when free agency opens. Mitch knows that he's had a few teams reach out, but he hasn't shared details and Mitch hasn't pried. He can be patient.

Mitch is considering calling Dylan to talk about packing, or the weather in Calgary, or if he maybe wants some company, when his phone starts ringing. He grins as he picks it up. "Were you reading my mind? I was about to call you."

Dylan laughs. "We're on the same wavelength," he says. "So, uh. I have a question for you."

"If you need someone to help you pack, I'll fly out, but I might spend more time distracting you than helping," Mitch says. "Your brother is probably a better option, even though I'd love to see you a few days early. Gotta get our time in while we can."

"About that," Dylan says, and Mitch can hear him grinning. "How would you feel about me getting that EpiPen?"

Mitch pulls in a breath, and he hears how sharp it sounds. "You don't mean one for an actual allergy," he clarifies, sitting down hard on the sofa. "You mean..."

"My agent got a call from Toronto," Dylan confirms. "I told him I was super interested, but if I go there, it has to be with a no-move. I'm willing to take less time and money as long as it means I can stay." He hesitates. "Stay with you, I mean."

"Dyls," Mitch breathes, and he's smiling so hard his cheeks hurt a little. "You would? You'd come home?"

"Pretty sure there are at least a dozen songs about wherever you are being my home," Dylan says, laughing a little. "I didn't want to commit to anything, even verbally, without talking to you first. If it's too soon—"

"Come home," Mitch cuts in. "Dylan, come _home_."

"Yeah?" Dylan asks. He's probably smiling as hard as Mitch is right now, and Mitch has no idea why they're not on FaceTime, but he doesn't want to hang up so they can switch. "Just so we're clear, I don't really want to move into your guest bedroom."

"Like you don't already know that it's full of workout stuff," Mitch says. "Oh my god, sign the contract. We can play together."

"We can retire together," Dylan says softly. "The preliminary offer was five years. My agent said they'll probably back it down to three when they hear that I want a no-move, and after three years, if they don't want to keep me on… I'm okay with that, Mitch. That's a pretty decent career."

"It is," Mitch says. "And once you sign here and we go all the way for the next three years, they'll see that we're magic together and sign us both for another decade."

Dylan laughs. "I like the way you dream."

"Come dream next to me," Mitch says. "Come dream _with_ me."

"I will," Dylan promises. "Guess I'm shipping all this shit to your place, eh?"

"We're burning anything with a Calgary logo on it, just so you know," Mitch informs him, and he hangs up to the sound of Dylan's laughter.

Mitch takes a moment to smile widely at nothing. Dylan's coming _home_. Six months ago he would have been queasy about the news, but now he can see it so clearly: the way they'll slot into each other's everyday lives, early morning rides to the rink together, collapsing in bed beside one another after a late game on the road. His future is spilling out in front of him, scene after scene, and every single freeze-frame has Dylan smiling at him, Dylan by his side, Dylan, Dylan. Dylan.

It's gonna be a really good future.

**Author's Note:**

> AND THEN THEY LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER.
> 
> -at the time i'm writing this, they haven't yet decided where the 2026 olympics are going to be. i picked sweden. time will tell?
> 
> -a quick guide to people mentioned only in passing or by nickname!  
> lilypad: timothy liljegren, currently a leafs defensive prospect, who has made the team by the time this fic takes place  
> conor timmins: current avs defensive prospect who is going to wreck worlds when he heals from his concussion issues  
> cozens: dylan cozens, currently of the lethbridge hurricanes, draft eligible in 2019.  
> jack hughes: the projected first overall pick for the 2019 draft.
> 
> -fun fact: i have never watched parks and rec, and i picked it 100% because i figured it would get people to be angry about the thought of a reboot. if my alpha/beta reader reaction is anything to go by: success.
> 
> -[ -i vote that we, as fans, never call the seattle team anything other than the kraken. not now, not when they inevitably let us down and name it something different, not ever.](https://www.sportsnet.ca/hockey/juniors/the-interview-mitch-marner-and-dylan-strome/)


End file.
